I made “The Nose” in the TNT today …
Last week, City Club announced a forum with two business leaders discussing their ideas for “bridging the ‘vitality gap’ between the dynamic UWT/museum district on one end, and the lively Ruston Way on the opposite end.” This week, club executive director Erik Hanberg disavowed the statement faster than a tourist hanging a U-turn after mistakenly driving to the north end of downtown. via thenewstribune.com For anyone who’s wondering, my speedy disavowal is pasted below. It was an unfortunate oversight that let that sentence into the press release and I really am wishing I’d been able to catch it ahead of Read more…
And now for City Club …
City Club's lunch this week will be with Janine Terrano (Topia Technology), Jim Merritt (Merritt Architecture), and CR Roberts (The News Tribune). The topic is downtown business. "Solutions only" is the tag line. I think it's going to be a pretty great lunch. RSVP by the end of Monday (office@cityclubtacoma.org). $22 for members, $30 for non-members. And if you're not a member, and haven't been before, mention you saw it here and we can invite you in at the member rate). Our last program was our dinner on 7/7. The speaker was Ziad Abusamha, a trustee at the Islamic Center. It Read more…
When China Rules the World by Martin Jacques
via amazon.com The World Trade Center, PLU, and City Club sponsored a lecture by Martin Jacques this morning. We were at the beautiful MOG theater and had a good-size crowd there. And the talk was fascinating. My first instinct when I heard the topic was “Isn’t that what everyone said about Japan 20 years ago?” But Jacques argument was rooted not in economic GDP data but history and other data that was fairly convincing. He touched on many themes including history, ethnicity, belief in the state, and others to suggest that as China modernizes they will not follow our model Read more…
I learned something about soil erosion last night …
Last night at City Club we heard from David Montgomery, a geomorphologist at the University of Washington. I've never heard of geomorphology, but it was an interesting presentation on … soil erosion. Really! Montgomery's main argument breaks down pretty simply: Farming allows civilization to happen. But plowing the earth, by default, erodes soil faster than it can naturally come back. Therefore over time, a civilization's soil becomes unable to keep up with the demands put on it. And then they fail. It takes a big leap to go from soil erosion to the collapse of civilization. And in fact, Montgomery Read more…
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